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Friday, September 23, 2011

Book Report: Firefly Lane by Kristin Hannah

This beauty took me over three weeks to read, and it wasn’t because I didn’t want to read and read and read! With work, school and life, it’s taking me longer than normal to read books lately. Firefly Lane by Kristin Hannah was one I’ve had my list of books to read for a long time. It was not, however, one that I had at the top of my list because someone had told me it was “just okay”. Then, my sweet friend Pam read it in a day! She absolutely LOVED and adored this book so I knew I had to read it right away as we have very similar tastes in what we read.

Firefly Lane is a book about two friends and everything they go through in life together… and apart. The story expands over three decades and so much happens. This is a sweet, special story about love and hope and forgiveness. Kate and Tully were two characters that I could really relate with. I have a BFF… My Lynn will forever and always be my BFF. We met in 7th grade and became friends the moment we met…. And have been ever since. Kate and Tully were the same way. And although my Lynn still lives in Minnesota and I live in Michigan, and we don’t see each other or talk as much as we’d like, she’ll always be my BFF and I know that her and I have a love that will last forever just like Kate and Tully! I really loved this book…. Probably one of the best books I’ve read in a long time. Kristin Hannah is rapidly becoming one of my favorite authors… Right up there with Diane Chamberlain and Jodi Picoult.

(My BFF Lynn and I in High School.)

Lesson learned: A book that someone else thinks is “just okay” may just be one that I think is amazing. Read it myself (and sooner) to find out! Now, I completely understand that not everyone will think this book is amazing… you might even think it’s “just okay”, but you’ll never know if you don’t read it so hurry and do so!

SPOILER (kinda) ALERT: Don’t read any further if you don’t want to know too much about the story, but following is some great information. I think this book would make a fabulous Lifetime-type movie (ooo.... maybe Lynn and I can play Kate and Tully!). Not only because of the dynamics of Kate and Tully’s friendship but because the author covers a very important topic – inflammatory breast cancer. Obviously you can guess that one of the characters ends up with this horrible disease. But the thing that really tugged at me was that I had never heard of this! We all know about self-examinations, mammograms and breast lumps in the typical breast cancer, but I was ignorant to the fact that redness, tenderness, swelling and skin-puckering can be an indicator of breast cancer as well, just a different kind. I don’t believe the awareness is as high for this type of breast cancer which is unfortunate because it’s just as life-threatening and can be misdiagnosed as a breast infection which can lead to deadly consequences. I think it’s important that the awareness is raised for inflammatory breast cancer so I wanted to share a great informational article that the Mayo Clinic has published. Please take the time to read this and share it with women you love.